14 days adventure in Australia – part two :)

Hi all,

It is high time to continue our Australian story. In case that you arrived directly to this page and you were not on this blog so far, you might be interested in reading the first part which is available here.

All others, let’s continue…! 🙂

Melbourne

We got back to Melton from Tasmania a bit before midnight, and a plan for tomorrow was already there. Since my cousin’s wedding was taking place on Saturday, we had time on Friday before 5PM since A. had to go to all those make-up artists and hear-dressers and people who make nice people even nicer for the wedding. So, not to waste our time we had to get up at 5.30 AM, and catch our first possible train from Melton to Melbourne! Friday was the day to explore the city centre! 🙂

We were almost late for the first train, so we run like crazy and in the end we got there like Japanese! Just In Time! 🙂 It takes 45 minutes from Melton to Melbourne central. For the most part of the trip we had this kind of view through our window, but then suddenly Melbourne started to appear on in our sight.

The first thing I’ve noticed was the Melbourne star (big wheel) and then the downtown skyline. In just couple of minutes we were in the centre on the Southern Cross train station. By the time we reached city centre it was already around 27 degrees and it looked like we’ll have a nice summer day ahead of us. We took a tram to the Melbourne Waterfront and walked towards the Melbourne star. It seemed like we were the only ones in the city as we arrived too early and all the shops and offices were closed.

We decided to walk back and around the docklands, and to be honest with you those apartment buildings there are just gorgeous, and I’ve immediately started to picture myself on the top balcony of one of these. Having a barbecue, enjoying the view and the sun.

Just in front of this great location there is a lovely coffee shop and we decided to sit outside and have a coffee. I’ve noticed there an incredible amount of jellyfish in the sea and even though we had to have our coffee inside the bar, since after just a few minutes sun was so strong that my lovely bold head could not stand it, the amount of jelly fish killed the wish to swim there. 🙂

Anyways, finally, summer time!! 🙂

After a coffee and some planning, we went to Melbourne star first which is the best place to start exploring of the city, as one can build his inner map and get some referent spots for easier orientation.

Besides, the view over Melbourne from the top of Melbourne Star is just gorgeous.

On the way back to the tram station, we stopped in one fancy shop to check and buy some souvenirs. When we started talking Croatian among us a worker there immediately started asking where from, how come this and that. In the end it seemed that he is Slovenian from somewhere around Novo Mesto, but when I tried speaking Slovenian with him he kept responding in English. He said that he is in Australia for 40 years, and that his Slovenian is not that good any more. Weird, as he had grey hair, meaning he must have been around at least 15-16 years old when he left Slovenia, so how come that person can forget his native language? Weird! 🙂

(And then you’ll see me writing posts in English only in few years 😀 )

We then took the tram again and our next destination was Casino East / Flinders Lane. From there we walked along the south-side promenade by the Yarra river to our next destination -> Eureka sky-deck 88! Walking on the promenade was quite pleasant or to say – burning? You see, even the city changed it’s name to – MelBURN! 🙂

And some people really enjoyed that hot summer day properly! 🙂

Eureka was the highest residential building on the south hemisphere until Ocean Heights in Dubai surpassed it in 2013. Well, I would totally agree with living in second tallest building on the hemisphere, let’s say on 80th floor. 🙂

The only problem would be paying a certain amount of money to send post since there’s a fee to enter the area. Maybe there’s a special tenant ticket and they can come here for free whenever they like? 🙂

The view from above is just awesome, and since it was a nice hot summer day with highs up to 36 degrees, it was awesome. We had to wait for some 30 minutes to our next experience, and there was no better way to spend time than to enjoy the apparently the best ice-cream that you can get on southern hemisphere! The golden gaytime! 🙂

And then we survived the EDGE. Edge is a glass box on the 88th floor that has lovely smart glass that is dimmed and you don’t see through. So you enter the box, you see nothing, box moves for a meter or two, smart glass gets turned on and suddenly you are in the air. Glass floor below you is transparent and you are on looking 88 floor below you. Impressive. It is even more impressive when you are in a group of people with an acrophobe (person that is afraid of heights). Well, we were that lucky that we had one acrophobe with us. This lady was so afraid to get in the box that she was not able to speak, she was not able to stop whimpering even though she was trying really hard. Knowing that I become emotional because of other people’s problems I almost started crying with her. 🙂 Luckily I managed not to! 🙂

Anyways, it’s a very special thing to do, and you never know how you can react once you figure out that below you and those 30cm of glass is nothing but 270 meters of the air. 🙂

After all these heights and being exposed to fresh air so high in the air, people usually get hungry. Apparently, there’s no better place on the whole continent to eat a nice juicy burger than in Merrywell. Well, since a single burger is 29$ it should be the best on the continent! 🙂

Well fed we continued our exploration of the city centre. We first noticed that you can rent a helicopter in Melbourne if you need to get transported faster from one side to the city centre. That was pretty cool and just during our stay there helicopter went for like 3-4 rides, so it’s obviously used frequently.

It’s no wonder since it’s located on the beginning of Melbourne business district “CBD”. We walked a bit through the CBD then we took a tram to Flinders street station. One interesting thing happened here. Trams in Melbourne are equipped with these metal “stop” tables that pop out when doors are open and people are running out of the tram. However you should walk straight out of the tram, and then took left or right turn. As we needed to turn left I took immediate left and managed to hit that “Stop” with my forehead pretty hard. I guess there could be some sign “Not for clumsy Europeans” or something. 🙂

Anyways, I decided not to sue Melbourne Tram, they are nice and clean and that was not the only accident I had in there, but the other one is not for large audience. 😀

From Flinders station we went walking towards the main train station.

On the way we passed by St Paul’s Cathedral and Melbourne University.

We stopped shortly in this part of the city to wonder around, buy some things and check for some souvenirs.

This one was one of the most original one I’ve ever seen. :))

After that we walked back towards the main train station and on the way I’ve noticed that weird errors in writing are happening even in Australia.

And then we figured out weird clouds above us. Some lucky girl got proposed via message on the sky! WOW! That must be true love! 🙂

We were also reminded that we should head home and finalize preparations for my cousin’s big day. It was already late afternoon and since it was a really hot day we were all looking forward to sit in the train and relax on the way home. I even managed to fall asleep. Later that afternoon we organized some final details for the wedding and we were all in celebration mode.

And then, cousin’s “D day” has come true! 🙂 It was extremely hot, 38 degrees, like someone from above wanted him to know what marriage is. 🙂

A priest said that he likes hot days as it reminds him why churches are built for. I’ll try to quote, but it might be that I did not remember it 100% correct. “Church is good in winter and rain, as it will keep you dry, and it’s good in summer heat as it remains cooler than outside.”

It sounded good at that particular moment. 🙂

Later that afternoon a crazy thing that can happen only in Melbourne occurred. Temperature dropped for almost 20 degrees within an hour, it was around 20. So by the time we moved from the church to the place where celebration took place it was fresh. Wedding was nice as expected, a bit of music, some food, some dances and Croatian and Macedonian customs.

Next day there was a classic Croatian “day after wedding” lunch held in Croatian society in Melbourne. I was having terrible headache that day, I guess due to mentioned temperature change. Still I’ve noticed two funny things for my readers.

First one is less funny, is the “broken Croatian” language. There were flyers dispatched around on all cars mentioning celebration of “Hrvatska Zora’s”. That would be “Croatian mornings” if you want to say it in English, or “Zore” as plural in Croatian. We don’t have “‘s” in Croatian. If we use the ” ‘ ” that is to mention that a character is omitted for some reason.

Second one was and still is hilarious. To understand it, you must be informed that there’s one weird thing in Australia, and it’s the need to belong to your “root tribe”. So many “Croatians” have the need to make sure that everyone in the world knows that they are Croatian.

That’s OK, but if you are Croatian, you should know what you are writing about yourself. “Cmarko” which is I guess “Croatian Marko” or some surname starting with “C” and name “Marko”. Let me explain you, first association for us at home is not Croatian Marko. “Cmarko” would be interpreted as “A little asshole” back home. 🙂

I was not in the mood to explain it back then, but I hope the person in charge will see this and change his plates. 🙂

Since I did not feel well, we had a relaxing Sunday, nothing interesting to report, except that we had to pack as tomorrow is another big day. We are visiting Sydney!

Sydney

We were in the plane at around 8 AM, and it was just an hour and a few minutes away from Sydney. As every morning I was taking notes about the day before as I did not want to forget any juicy details. 🙂 Yes, people take notes about their travels. At least I do! 🙂

Sydney’s airport is located relatively close to the city centre (which is apparently a problem for Sydney, but not for us travelers 🙂 ) so when you are approaching the airport you can immediately see all the beauty of it before you even land.

Lovely view, ha? 🙂

Gorgeous purple Jacaranda trees were visible from the air, and it seemed that Sydney is packed with them. You almost can’t turn around without having one lovely purple tree that smells so nice.

Luckily, I know people even in Australia so I called my friend mr. S. and we got a full royal treatment there! He picked us up with breakfast and drinks in a nice car, and we immediately headed to see Sydney’s north. We first crossed the famous Harbor Bridge.

And then we stopped on the northern side of the city for a short photo shooting.

Then we drove all the way to the Ku Ring Gai Chase National park, stopped there several times and planned to have a swim on the Sydney’s beach on the top north, Palm Beach but as you can see from the photo below, weather was not our ally that day so we decided to head to West Head and try to make some photos.

After that we had a gorgeous lunch at the Church Point. While we were eating weather cleared a bit so we headed to the Freshwater beach to check it out. Still, was not good enough to swim, but was good enough to get an idea how beaches around Sydney look like.

As S. needed to finish some work that day he dropped us on the Manley beach and told us that Bondi is a lovely beach on the south, but it is too touristy, and that locals, especially those living on the northern side prefer Manley beach. Well, we did not plan to visit Bondi since it’s “just a beach”.

While we were walking along Manley we were lucky enough to see a confused penguin, and several big lizards that are domicile and protected in the Manley area.

After that we had a pint on Manley cove and we took a ferry to Circular Quay. Circular Quay is positioned next to the Sidney Opera, so it was obvious that we will see it again. This time from the seaside. 🙂

We run into our apartment then to leave our baggage and take the keys. It was already 6PM and we were hungry so we decided to walk through whole Potts Point and Royal Botanical Gardens to the Sydney Opera and then head to the city centre and have a dinner somewhere there.

When we arrived to the opera, I had to take a closer look of these special self washing tiles that are used to cover the opera and make her look nice and clean all the time.

Well, obviously I’m not the only one doing it or these guys just copied my photo idea! 🙂

At that point we figured out that there is a restaurant within the building of Sydney Opera looking towards Harbor Bridge. We’ve also noticed that prices are maybe a bit higher than in Dublin, but as we were there we decided that we should not waste such an opportunity. And so, a platter of scampi to share, a pork belly special to share, three deserts and a bottle of vine – 120 Euros. Having in mind that a bottle of gorgeous Australian wine was 50% of the price, I would say that food was cheap. Eating on such place, priceless!

Even better, another friend, another S. that lives in Sydney joined us. That’s why 3 deserts. 🙂

Later that evening we headed to Australia Square to the “O bar”, which is situated on the top of one of the highest skyscrapers in Sydney and it rotates. So we did almost 2 full circles and we enjoyed the company of S.& S. and the night out in Sydney.

Next morning we had to say goodbye to Ben and his apartment at the Potts Point. And that was the hardest thing to do for me. I was depressed for a couple of days after that, and if I continue thinking about it I’ll get depressed again. Such a fantastic spot, fantastic place.

Since Ben is obviously a southsider, his opinion of Bondi beach was a bit different, and he advised us to see it since it’s Sydney’s best known beach. Well, we decided to change our plans a bit and listen to Ben. So first we had an Avocado on Toast sandwich in a coffee shop nearby, and then we headed to Bondi beach.

Since this day was a bit warmer than the day before, I was determined to take a swim in Sydney, but as I dipped my legs in the ocean I noticed weird blue creatures. Luckily, Internet is everywhere so I googled “blue jellyfish Sydney” immediately and figured out that I don’t really want to test if I’m allergic to Bluebottle jellyfish, so I gave up. Damn you jellyfish!

Well, since we could not swim we decided to go back to the city centre exploration, and on the way we’ve noticed a safe sex promotion. I guess it’s quite obvious what is the point of this promotion.

We’ve then climbed the highest tower in Sydney to take a look at it from proper location.

And then we walked all the way to the Rocks, the oldest part of the city. We had a chance to eat all those weird pizzas with Kangaroo, Emu and Crocodile meat.

After the Rocks we walked to and around Darling Harbor, another lovely bay in Sidney where you can walk, enjoy and dine out.

But it was already 6PM and time to leave this gorgeous city. S. picked us up at the exit of Darling Harbor, and took us home for a pint and then dropped us at the Airport.

We returned to Melton happy as Sydney is definitely a place worth seeing.

And since I have at least one more post of this size to write, I’ll stop here, and you stay tuned for more soon! 🙂

As yes, there is more!

Till the next post…

Love

Balky